Nelson Family Vacation 09

Our little family went on our first family vacation as a family this last week. We had been thinking about visiting Mt. Rushmore since last year and decided since J wasn't going to be in school this summer now was our chance. So we left on Monday July 6. Our first stop on our trip was Martin's Cove. Due to the history of the place I was thinking it would be a great spiritual experience to be there. Well.. that's where I made my first mistake. I let us get talked into taking a handcart up to the trail to where Martin's cove is. The main reason is we thought A would enjoy the ride. Then came my second mistake. I misunderstood the mileage on the map between the visitors center and the actual cove. It turns out instead of the couple of miles I thought it was, it turned out to be five miles round trip and that doesn't include the mile walk around the cove. So instead of enjoying it, I was miserable. We also ended up getting eaten by the biggest mosquitoes I've ever seen. Plus it rained on us towards the end of pulling the handcart. So one piece of advice. If you plan on going to Martin's Cove, go more towards the fall, wear bug spray and wait until the kids are older. Course that's just my opinion. So I ended up being hot, tired and very grumpy. Plus we still had to drive to Casper, WY where our hotel was. During our drive to Casper we also wanted to stop at a place called Independence Rock which is famous for having people's signatures on there from when they crossed the area in the mid 1800s. It was supposed to be close to Martin's Cove, but we never saw it. Arriving in Casper we proceeded to find our hotel which was the Ramada. According to Hotwire whom we booked through it was a three-star hotel. Well.. to me it was maybe about a one-star hotel. The pool was broken, the rooms were old and smelled funny. I was glad to be there only one night but sad to realize we would stay there on our way back home. I do plan on writing a bad review for the hotel. The next day we took off for South Dakota. We stopped at a little pizzeria in Lusk, WY due to my husband's request that we try to eat at various places instead of the fast food chains that you can find anywhere. It was a nice change. Then we were off to Jewel Cave, the second largest cave in the world, Mount Rushmore and Crazy Horse Monument.

We got to Jewel Cave only to find out that tickets were required and they were sold out for the day. So we bought tickets to go back the next day. On our way to Crazy Horse we had to pass thru Custard, WY and there they had a Flintstones park. Yes, as in Fred and Wilma Flintstone. We decided not to pay the $9 per adult to go on but we did get some food from the drive-inn that was fashioned like the one in the cartoon. We then drove to the Crazy Horse monument. As we were getting close to Crazy Horse you could see it over the tops of the trees. It was pretty amazing. We were able to get in for free due to J being active with the military. We learned from a film that we watched that the four heads on Mount Rushmore would fit inside the head of Crazy Horse. How's that for a wow factor? We bought some rocks from there that were remains from the blasting that they do for the sculpture. We hung out there for a couple of hours and realized that time was passing quicker then expected and I wanted to find the hotel we were staying at in Rapid City, SD before it got dark. I don't know about you but I hate trying to find new places in the dark. So we drove out to Rapid City and found our hotel. It was a Days Inn, but it was so much nicer then the Ramada we had stayed in!! After locating our hotel we took off for Mount Rushmore. As it was later in the evening we were able to watch them light up the monument. We thought we were going to return the next day and see it in the day time but that never panned out, so I never got a souvenir from Mount Rushmore, only pictures.

On Wednesday we returned to Jewel Cave to begin our adventure there. We knew it was going to be about a hour and twenty minutes underground and there would be lots of walking. Turns out there were stairs, lots of stairs and they were narrow so J ended up carrying A through most of the cave. It was very beautiful inside, although my claustrophobia was starting to creep up on me towards the end. After escaping the underground cave we took off for Wall, SD.

If you are a fan of the travel channel you already know why we went to Wall. For those who don't have the travel channel or don't watch it as often as I do, in the city of Wall they have a store called Wall Drug. It is definitely a tourist trap full of oddities and fun little opportunities for photos. A had not been awake long from another of his naps in the car when we went to the back of Wall Drug to see their dinosaur there. It was a T-rex that looked like it was on lone from the set of Jurassic Park. There was a cage around it and some flashing red lights. A sign next to it said it fed every twelve minutes. We got there just in time for a "feeding." Smoke started rising from the cage and noises started coming from the T-rex. I looked down and noticed that A was just shaking. He was totally terrified!! I have never seen him shake from terror. We left before it was over but the rest of the time we were in the back area, A kept looking for the dinosaur that he was sure was going to eat him. In the store J found something he has wanted since he first heard of them. He begged and begged and since I couldn't take it anymore he got his hearts desire. The head of a jacakalope that one can hang on the wall. My only condition for the hideous thing was that it not be displayed in our house, only in the garage. So next time you stop by the house J will be sure to show off his greatest prize yet.

On Thursday we checked out of the hotel and took off for Deadwood, SD. Deadwood is full of history and lots of connections to the wild west era. It is also the place that has the graves of Wild Bill Hickok and Calamity Jane. The downtown was just beautiful. It was more beautiful then Park City to me. Their were also very many historic homes that were well taken care of. Since Deadwood started out as a gambling town there were still many casinos there. Of course just like in Vegas there were displays in the casinos to draw the tourist in. We went and saw Nelsons Car Garage that had Magnum PI's Ferrari, Herbie the Love Bug, James Bonds Aston Martin and other cars. One casino had a massive model railroad train display in it's basement where you deposited fifty cents and watched the trains go through tunnels and towns. We had lunch at a buffet in the Gold Dust Casino then walked over to Adams Museum where they had three floors of museum pieces. Then we drove up to the Mount Moriah cemetery where Wild Bill and Calamity and a few other notorious wild west characters were buried. Then it was off to Devil's Tower, WY. If you don't know what Devil's Tower is, let me mention my best point of reference. "Close Encounters of the Third Kind." Yeup, it's the mountain from the movie. The one where Richard Dreyfuss character makes it out of mashed potatoes and says "This means something." We didn't actually end up going into the park and get closer as A was passed out asleep and we decided it was more important that he get a nap. So after taking a few photos it was back to Casper, WY to spend the night. We finally figured out where Independence rock was. Remember me mentioning the rest stop? Turns out that Independence rock was right by the rest stop and was a domed shape rock, not the pointy rock both J and I had conjured up in our heads. So we stopped there and climbed to the top, but not before having to retreat to our car and get bug spray as the massive mosquitoes had returned. We stopped at Evanston on our way back and now own some possibly questionable fireworks that we plan on lighting off for the 24th. During this trip A managed to have a melt down at every stop. We don't know why they kept happening. He may have just been sick of being stuck in a car as we drove to different places or maybe it was the fact he didn't have anyone but mom and dad to play with. J also wasn't feeling the greatest as he was probably fighting the flu bug that I had had the weekend before we left. We have learned a lot though by this vacation. Don't try to cram too much stuff into a vacation, especially with a small child and be flexible with planning. Hopefully though we'll be able to take vacations more often though then every two - three years!!